Contraction, Contraction, What's Your Function?

Since I've already voiced my opinion on having boobs, monthly blood hemorrhaging and occasional raging infections, I thought I'd remain ever so classy and fair to give my take on the excruciating and laborious toleration of uterine torture. Wouldn't want to leave any body parts out.

This topic was spawned because of my waking this morning at roughly 4:56, feeling as if I had just had my appendix taken out, or was maybe sporting a fresh, newly installed colostomy bag. Upon wiping the sleep from my eyes and clambering my way into consciousness, I realized I simply had cramps. For the next hour, I flopped around in my sheets like fish in the bottom of an old, mildewy canoe, squinching my eyes thinking that maybe if I pretend to be a boy, I could sleep a little while longer. No dice.

After getting ready at the speed of smell, I stepped into the frigid Oklahoma/February weather and felt my lower abdomen convulse and I gripped the siding of my house for support. It stopped me dead in my tracks much like Jeff from "Today's Special" when his hat fell off. Too bad a good ole "hocus pocus alimagocus" couldn't get my uterus seizure to desist and go skipping happily down the sidewalk to my car. So needless to say, my prostaglandins continued their poisonous drip while my subconscious drove my car to work. With tunnel vision, I sat in the drivers seat and went to my happy place, taking quick, short breaths as I was sure my my lower half had been severed off and was somewhere lounging in the back seat. I tried to contemplate what actual birthing contractions might be like. I envisioned my belly peeling open like a banana and spewing forth acid and piranhas. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's what its gonna feel like.

I've always thought that having a male ob gyn would be weird because how could a man really know what cramps felt like? I could never quite verbally illustrate it justifiably until today. Gentlemen, you know that feeling you get in your gut after a hard night of cheap beer drinking or maybe your fourth meal entree of sum yung guy from the chinese takee-outee? That feeling like something's coming for you. Something really, really bad. It's that feeling right before the onslaught of the green apple splatters, that intense wave of anguish and torture where you are instantaneously paralyzed, on the threshold of passing out and the only thought running through your mind is whether or not you can possibly take your next breath without crapping yourself or crying. Yeah. That's what our baby maker does, encompassing our entire lower half, waist to knees, EVERY MONTH. So if she gets stroke-faced occasionally or if she collapses and writhes in agony like Sigourney Weaver in Alien, cut her some slack and don't get all weird. You now know just. how. bad. it. can. be.

Planes, Trains and Sociopaths

Every time I step aboard a plane (which isn’t often on my meager salary) I am captivated by the mystery of what lies ahead. Like a five year old, I stare at the engine, the wings, the rickety tray in front of me and contemplate how this is all going to work. The wings always seem too short to send this fourteen thousand pound lump of steel, plastic and human flesh hurtling through the air. I spend a lot of time on each flight going over the aerodynamics of it all just to give myself some comfort and revel in the fact that I might be smart.
What is even more mystifying is the social aspect of each flight. Hundreds of strangers sharing the same air, all destined for the same location, even if just temporarily. The flight I am on now is no different. I’m sitting here in awe and overly aware of how rude people can be in an already uncomfortable situation. Why make it harder? We all want a nice easy trip. So we stopped in Dallas on the way to Houston when a toadstool of a woman waddled at the speed of smell down the narrow aisle. The 22 people loaded up like pack mules behind her were leaving. She was just switching to a better seat. Despite the fact that half the plane was backed up behind her, she decided she needed to use the bathroom. Like a ten pound bowling ball, she started rolling back through the line of people without so much as an "excuse me" as if she were the queen of some foreign country. From what I could tell, the only thing she was queen of was high calorie food. Was the mean of me? I’m sorry.
Then there was the elderly lady getting on the plane. The short Indian man sitting next to me had taken a trip to the lavatory when she tried to sit down in his seat. Politely I said, "Ma’am, I’m sorry but I think a gentleman was sitting there." She turned at me with her cold, glassy eyes and impatiently said, "Do you think or do you know?" Taken aback, I uttered, "Pardon?" She huffed and repeated herself, pacing her words in case I was retarded, "Do-you-think-or-do-you-know?" As I felt my fangs unsheathing for the first time in my life towards a senior citizen, I turned to her and bugged my eyes like my father used to when I was in trouble as a kid. In my best southern "I’m gonna kick-your-ass- politely" tone, I replied, "Oh, I know!" I wasn't certain about the Indian guys situation but I sure as heck knew I didn’t want to sit next to what could possibly be Omarosa’s bitter and odious step-mother during my vacation voyage. However, her absolute hatefulness did completely erase the discomfort of sitting next to the largest man on the plane on the first leg of my flight.
It goes without saying that when everybody wants to get to their destination and no one wants to be hassled or bothered, don’t go bothering everyone else like you’re the only one on the planet. Especially when you are in such an enclosed place and so many people can give you a collective beat-down. It’s just not smart or safe. On that thought, I look out the window and see glimmering snow and ice careening horizontally past my window, looking eerily like a roadway at night. It soothes my anger and I set my thoughts about small minded people behind me to dream of the warmer weather that awaits me and the radiant, pure smile of two-month old baby boy that awaits me at my gate. Ahhh….. How flying should be.